The invention also relates to a method for automatically separating the wishbone from eviscerated poultry bodies using a cutting means, wherein each poultry body is held by a holding apparatus of a revolving conveyor, wherein the conveyor transports the holding apparatuses in a direction of transport along at least one processing station, by means of which the wishbone is separated from the poultry body.
Such apparatuses and methods for separating the wishbone from eviscerated poultry bodies are known from the state of the art. The revolving conveyor with the at least one holding apparatus is usually part of an apparatus for processing animal bodies or parts of animal bodies and is used particularly in processing poultry. The eviscerated poultry bodies are thereby often placed as material to be processed in a loading area on one of the previously mentioned holding apparatuses or, more precisely, on one of the support bodies of the holding apparatuses. A plurality of such holding apparatuses is particularly preferably attached to said revolving conveyor. The conveyor transports the holding apparatuses and thus the eviscerated poultry bodies from processing station to processing station. One of these processing stations is the cutting unit designed for separating the wishbone from the poultry body. Along the cutting unit, the holding apparatus is preferably oriented in a manner so that the breastbone of the poultry body points downward or in the direction of the floor and the neck of the poultry body points in the direction of conveyance of the conveyor.
A system for automatic separation of the wishbone of eviscerated poultry bodies is known from the patent document DE 60 2004 006 451 T2. To prevent breakage of the wishbone or contamination of the fillet by bone splinters during automatic separation of the wishbone, an apparatus and a method are presented in this document. According to the method, the wishbone is twisted out of the shoulder joint. A processing station adapted accordingly for this includes a piercer and a separation blade. To separate the wishbone, the piercer is first inserted into the body from above between the shoulder joint and the wishbone. After that the piercer is moved away by the holding apparatus of the poultry body, which exerts a certain pressure on the wishbone. The displacement of the piercer thus leads to a corresponding displacement of the wishbone. After the displacement of the piercer, a separation blade, which was previously arranged on the breast side of the poultry body, moves back and forth in a vertical plane with respect to the poultry body, so that the separation blade cuts the poultry body below the wishbone and below a lowest position of the piercer.
Such known apparatuses and methods for automatic separation of the wishbone of eviscerated poultry bodies thus have the disadvantage that multiple processing steps are necessary to separate the wishbone from the eviscerated poultry body without damage. In practical application, the effort accompanying the plurality of processing steps required results in correspondingly high costs and moreover in many cases also limits the transport speed of the conveyor. Furthermore, due to the multiplicity of elements engaging with the poultry body to separate the wishbone from the eviscerated poultry body, the known methods and means rely on complex control and/or regulation to coordinate the motion sequences of the multiple elements engaging with the poultry body with one another. The high mechanical complexity and corresponding high complexity of control and regulation also limit the known apparatuses with regard to their maximum processing speed.
It is therefore the task of the present invention to provide an apparatus which is as simple and cost-effective as possible and a corresponding method for complete removal of the wishbone from the body of an eviscerated poultry body without damage.